Maybe the VGAs are trying to portray themselves as the awards for "real gamers" with these nominations. Previously they would pick two games with ridiculous metacritics and then round it off with the big holiday sellers. This year they pretty much ignored what will be the four best selling games of the year. Assassins Creed Revelations, Battlefield 3, Gears of War 3, MW3. They included skyrim only because it is a big seller that I guess they assume will also have ridiculously high critical reviews.
Or maybe since the goal of the nominations is to attract the most viewers, they picked the games that they believe would attract the most viewers. Portal 2 and Skyrim would get PC gamers. Zelda would get Wii gamers. Skyrim and Arkham City would get the 360 gamers. Uncharted 3 and Arkham City would get the ps3 gamers. They ignored the blockbuster holiday titles because the majority of people who buy those games aren't the target audience for a video game award show.
